It has recently come to Daily RFT's attention that while Missouri has, among many other symbols, a state bird (bluebird), state game bird (bobwhite quail), state invertebrate (crayfish), state animal (the Missouri mule), state American folk dance (the square dance) and will soon, pending approval by the state legislature, have a state exercise (the jumping jack, invented by Missouri native General "Black Jack" Pershing), it lacks a state dog.
How can this be? What creature can possibly be more beloved? (Besides, of course, the cat?) Eleven states already have state dogs. Are we Missourians not as deserving of a state dog as the residents of Louisiana (Catahoula Leopard dog) or Wisconsin (American Water Spaniel)? Have we been cowed by the travails of the legislators of Kansas, who, upon the nomination of cairn terrier (just like Toto from The Wizard of Oz) were besieged by anguished yapping from PETA, which claimed that the introduction of a state dog would be taken as an excuse to create more puppy mills?
No! We are Missourians! We are a state of hunters and park-strollers and couch potatoes, a state of people who love dogs! Do we not love our dogs more than we love our crayfish? Of course we do!
And so Daily RFT would like to humbly submit, for your consideration, a few candidates for Missouri state dog.
